BTCC teams have expressed 'interest' in other series before - remember SCV8? T1? It doesn't mean anything will come of it.

Agreed. The current BTCC teams may all stay as they are and nothing will change. I just think it would be short-sighted to think that it definitely won't happen.
It's a possibility, but currently only that. It will be interesting to see how things develop in both categories over the next few years.

I'm all for more touring car racing, but if I was looking to splash my company logo all over a racing car, I know which series I'd pick...

I guess this is the crux of the matter. I've seen a few articles floating around today where people are suggesting that TCR UK will take the place of BTCC within five years. I'd be pretty surprised if this were to happen, I think at best BTCC may adopt TCR rules (or a derivative) but can't really see this happening either. Getting a huge grid is only a small part of the recipe that goes towards trying to challenge a series that has a 50+ year history in this country, there are so many other things which need to put in to place.

As I've alluded to earlier in this thread I don't see either series stepping on the others toes initially (although I do have worries for other series in the UK) At the moment it seems that neither camp have this on their mind and are happy to let the other get on with their own thing. I really hope it continues the last thing we need is a war of attrition between the two series.

I'm all for more touring car racing, but if I was looking to splash my company logo all over a racing car, I know which series I'd pick...

I guess that partly depends on who your target audience is.
BTCC might generate the highest viewing figures, but a lot of the sponsors are not interested in the 'general public' market.

Duo, Norlin, TAG Industries, Simpson Exhausts, Hansford Sensors, Metclad etc. are not looking to sell to the typical ITV4 viewer, but more for the corporate association their brand has with racing. If they can get the same corporate benefit in another series, they'll be there in a heartbeat.

so those teams would walk away from their successful campaigns in by far the biggest series in the UK with massive spectators and TV and profile to one that doesnt have any of that, and doesn't allow their manufacturer support or even allow RWD? lol.

You are thinking about this as a fan, you need to look at it from a team manager perspective.

The like of HARD and Motorbase aren't doing this for fun, they are businesses and need to earn money/make a profit. TCR offers a very similar business model to GT3/GT4, something both have experience of.

The team buys a couple of cars; they aren't hugely expensive and there is no development budget required as there would be when building a new NGTC car. They then run them, or essentially rent them out, to a couple of paying drivers for 6 or 7 TCR UK rounds. With no TBL requirements they don't even need to have the same drivers all year, they can do it on a race-by-race basis with a different driver every week.

On non-UK race weekends, convince your drivers that they would like to race at Spa or wherever and do a Benilux or German TCR round. Doesn't even need to be the same drivers, just as long as someone is paying for a drive. No TCR rounds this weekend?; with minimal changes the car can be run in Britcar or Creventic 24hr series, or even on an arrive-and-drive basis in one of the many club open saloon series.

With that sort of business model, the number of spectators and amount of TV coverage is largely irrelevant to the team - they get paid by the driver, not by the spectators. The more often they run the cars, potentially the more income they can get.

At the end of the season you have a car that needs only minimal updates to be usable for another year, or is still a valuable, easily sell-able asset. Same can not be said for NGTC cars, where unless you sell the car and your TBL as a package, the second-hand NGTC market is almost non-existant.

Consider that Creventic and VLN have massive grids of cars 60-150 at some events. These cars range from expensive, to relatively cheap, and include a lot of TCR cars. These races get very little coverage outside of hardcore motorsport fans, yet the grids are huge even when 4 people watch live on YouTube.

So if Creventic makes it work, why is it so hard to make it work for a TCR UK series?

Consider that Creventic and VLN have massive grids of cars 60-150 at some events. These cars range from expensive, to relatively cheap, and include a lot of TCR cars. These races get very little coverage outside of hardcore motorsport fans, yet the grids are huge even when 4 people watch live on YouTube.

So if Creventic makes it work, why is it so hard to make it work for a TCR UK series?

Well said. I think there's a certain amount of desire to see TCR UK fail here, which I think is a shame.

If it comes in as a great feeder series for BTCC brilliant, if it challenges BTCC eventually, brilliant.

You are thinking about this as a fan, you need to look at it from a team manager perspective.

The like of HARD and Motorbase aren't doing this for fun, they are businesses and need to earn money/make a profit. TCR offers a very similar business model to GT3/GT4, something both have experience of.

The team buys a couple of cars; they aren't hugely expensive and there is no development budget required as there would be when building a new NGTC car. They then run them, or essentially rent them out, to a couple of paying drivers for 6 or 7 TCR UK rounds. With no TBL requirements they don't even need to have the same drivers all year, they can do it on a race-by-race basis with a different driver every week.

On non-UK race weekends, convince your drivers that they would like to race at Spa or wherever and do a Benilux or German TCR round. Doesn't even need to be the same drivers, just as long as someone is paying for a drive. No TCR rounds this weekend?; with minimal changes the car can be run in Britcar or Creventic 24hr series, or even on an arrive-and-drive basis in one of the many club open saloon series.

With that sort of business model, the number of spectators and amount of TV coverage is largely irrelevant to the team - they get paid by the driver, not by the spectators. The more often they run the cars, potentially the more income they can get.

At the end of the season you have a car that needs only minimal updates to be usable for another year, or is still a valuable, easily sell-able asset. Same can not be said for NGTC cars, where unless you sell the car and your TBL as a package, the second-hand NGTC market is almost non-existant.

Well said. I think there's a certain amount of desire to see TCR UK fail here, which I think is a shame.

If it comes in as a great feeder series for BTCC brilliant, if it challenges BTCC eventually, brilliant.

Competition breeds success

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I personally prefer the TCR cars over NGTC, and ive not been shy in previously sharing my comments over the NGTC car regs.

I think what Gow fears is regulations getting away from his control, that happened with supertouring (after initally founding the regs - to a degree), the FIA got involved, lots of technical waivers and enhancements, series went under. I guess you could argue the same for S2000, although for that, it wasn't Gow's baby, his thing was BTC and he reluctantly adopted the S2000 regs, however the same thing happeend, costs spiraled (because they couldnt control them). At least with only the BTCC running NGTC, he and TOCA can control the regs, which I think is his fear and why he wants to keep the BTCC isolated and seperate from other series, so he can control it.

with standalone events they will get just a few hundred spectators, like club racing.

It is club racing.

Quote:

Originally Posted by Rob877

I guess this is the crux of the matter. I've seen a few articles floating around today where people are suggesting that TCR UK will take the place of BTCC within five years. I'd be pretty surprised if this were to happen, I think at best BTCC may adopt TCR rules (or a derivative) but can't really see this happening either.

BTCC rules are fixed until 2022, so they certainly won't be adopting TCR within five years.

Quote:

Originally Posted by crmalcolm

I guess that partly depends on who your target audience is.
BTCC might generate the highest viewing figures, but a lot of the sponsors are not interested in the 'general public' market.

Duo, Norlin, TAG Industries, Simpson Exhausts, Hansford Sensors, Metclad etc. are not looking to sell to the typical ITV4 viewer, but more for the corporate association their brand has with racing. If they can get the same corporate benefit in another series, they'll be there in a heartbeat.

If they were only interested in B2B, they would already be sponsoring club racing.

They are not. They are not even going for the halfway house of club racing with a decent TV package (by which I mean the Clio Cup, Ginetta GT4 Supercup etc).

They sponsor the BTCC because of its profile, which they won't get with TCR, at least not in the short term.

Duo, for example, sponsor BTCC teams primarily to entertain clients in the hospitality. But are those clients going to be as interested in going to a championship they've never heard of?

Quote:

Originally Posted by Sodemo

I think what Gow fears is regulations getting away from his control, that happened with supertouring (after initally founding the regs - to a degree), the FIA got involved, lots of technical waivers and enhancements, series went under. I guess you could argue the same for S2000, although for that, it wasn't Gow's baby, his thing was BTC and he reluctantly adopted the S2000 regs, however the same thing happeend, costs spiraled (because they couldnt control them). At least with only the BTCC running NGTC, he and TOCA can control the regs, which I think is his fear and why he wants to keep the BTCC isolated and seperate from other series, so he can control it.

BTC wasn't Gow's. He'd gone before those regs came in, and he got rid of them pretty much immediately when he returned.